had been his great difficulty on first entering the
House of Commons. What should be his party?

He had worked hard as a lawyer. In so doing no party had been
necessary to him. Honest hard work--honest, that is, as regarded the
work itself, if not always so as regarded the object. Honest hard
work, and some cunning in the method of his eloquence, had at first
sufficed him. He was not called upon to have, or at any rate to
state, any marked political tenets. But no man can rise to great note
as a lawyer without a party. Opulence without note would by no means
have sufficed with Mr. Harcourt.

When, therefore, he found it expedient in the course of his
profession to go into Parliament, and with this object presented
himself to the inhabitants of the Battersea Hamlets, it was necessary
that he should adopt a party. At that time the political watchword
of the day was the repeal of the corn laws. Now the electors of the
Battersea Hamlets required especially to know whether Mr. Harcourt
was or was not for free trade in corn.

To tell the truth, he did not care two straws about corn. He cared
only for law--for that and what was to be got by it. It was necessary
that he should assume some care for corn--learn a good deal about
it, perhaps, so as to be able, if called on, to talk on the subject
by the hour at a stretch; but it was not a matter on which he was
personally solicitous a fortnight or so before he began his canvass.

The Conservatives were at that time in, and were declared foes
to free trade in corn. They were committed to the maintenance
of a duty on imported wheat--if any men were ever politically
committed to anything. Indeed, it had latterly been their great
shibboleth--latterly; that is, since their other greater shibboleths
had been cut from under their feet.

At that time men had not learnt thoroughly by experience, as now they
have, that no reform, no innovation--experience almost justifies
us in saying no revolution--stinks so foully in the nostrils of an
English Tory politician as to be absolutely irreconcilable to him.
When taken in the refreshing waters of office any such pill can
be swallowed. This is now a fact recognized in politics; and it
is a great point gained in favour of that party that their power
of deglutition should be so recognized. Let the people want what
they will, Jew senators, cheap corn, vote by ballot, no property
qualification, or anything else, the Tories will carry it for th